There is great interest and need for water purification for developing countries. The world population is approximately 6.7 billion people and is expected to be over 8 billion by 2050. Roughly 1.1 billion people in the world lack access to safe drinking water. Available water sources can be contaminated by pathogens. Roughly 2.2 million die each year from consumption of pathogen contaminated water and 9500 children die each day.
Most of the work reported in the literature for pathogen removal from water involves replaceable filter units. These units generally consist of packed cartridges, filter membranes, or special filter papers. Though organisms over 10 micron can be easily captured by these techniques, smaller organisms including bacterial spores in the size range of 1 micron are typically not captured with sufficient efficiency.